


Stevonnie Gets A Job

by CaptainJZH



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Customers - Freeform, Employment, Gen, Retail, drudgery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-10-20 00:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20665988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainJZH/pseuds/CaptainJZH
Summary: Connie needs a job, and Steven wants one to see what it's like. The solution? Stevonnie gets a job!





	Stevonnie Gets A Job

**Author's Note:**

  * For [E350tb](https://archiveofourown.org/users/E350tb/gifts).

Connie parked Lion outside the supermarket, heading in to grab a couple things on her way home from college. Winter break was just starting, and she needed to stock up on food back home (her parents still provided for her, but she liked to buy her own groceries). She didn’t get much, only some essentials, plus some Lion Lickers to coax her ride with.

“Ma’am, I’m afraid your card was declined,” the cashier told her.

“Wait, what?”

“Your card, it was declined.”

“But...no, I swear I had money in my account…” Connie looked behind her and saw a line was forming. “Ugh, I’ll just pay with cash.” By the end of the transaction, Connie’s wallet was empty. She walked out of the store, checking her bank account on her phone as she mounted herself atop Lion.

_ “Empty?!”  _ she exclaimed, seeing the zeroes on the screen. “I didn’t spend  _ that  _ much…” Then Connie got to thinking: With the cost of textbooks, lab fees, campus food, Totally Legal Substances and school supplies, it was no wonder Connie was broke. As Lion leapt through the warp portal, Connie sighed to herself.

She needed a job.

\---

Steven slept in until 2pm. He could afford to do that, though, since he didn’t have anything to do during the day. Or night. Or anytime lately, considering the Diamonds, Homeworld Loyalists, the corrupted gems, the Cluster and the fusion experiments were no longer threats. He had more or less fallen into the habit of binge-watching  _ Crying Breakfast Friends  _ over and over again — he never got tired of seeing the Great Dinner Ascendancy get redeemed by Spork and his friends.

But, his habits had kinda suffered. He ate more, drank less, showered less, brushed his teeth less… Steven was quickly realizing that he benefited from some kind of structure. When he was a kid, Pearl was usually the one telling him to do all these things, but now? He had to stick to a schedule on his own.

So, as Steven maxed-out his characters in  _ Crying Breakfast Friends: Save the Stove  _ for the umpteenth time, he thought about how “normal” people found structure in their lives. Well, normally people had jobs to keep busy with. Steven had once told Peedee that being a Crystal Gem was his job, and for much of his life that was true. But now, Steven was considering getting a legitimate job, just to see what it was like.

Then Connie showed up, kicking down the door in a huff. “Ugh, stupid money, stupid unemployment, stupid expensive school supplies…” she muttered as she paced around.

“Uh, you okay?” Steven asked, floating down from his loft.

“I’m...fine. Just broke.”

“Oh no, where did you break? Can I heal it?” Steven went on, worried.

Connie chuckled. “No, no, I mean money. Even with a scholarship, school costs a  _ ton.”  _ She sat down on the couch. “So if I want to have  _ anything  _ next year, I gotta get a job. And you know how that is...”

“Actually, no I don’t.”

“Ah, right, sorry.”

“Say, I was just thinking about getting a job, too.”

“Getting a— Steven, your dad is still a millionaire.”

“Well yeah, but I don’t want to just  _ sit around  _ all day. I wanna do something! See how normal kids have it!”

“Heh, I hope we don’t end up competing for the same job. Though with this economy, we probably will…”

Steven paused to think. “I’m not sure what an ‘economy’ is, but I do know one way we can both have the same job.”

Connie caught on fast. “Steven...” she said, wrapping her arm around him and pulling the young man into a kiss. His gem activated, enveloping the two in a pink glow. Stevonnie opened their eyes moments later.

_ “...I like the way you think.” _

\---

“So, uh, what made you decide to apply here at Malmart?” Assistant Manager Bill Dewey asked, appearing more nervous than Stevonnie as their interview went on.

Stevonnie shrugged. “I like money.”

“Heh, uh, good answer,” Dewey laughed slightly. 

“Say, didn’t you used to work at the Big Donut?”

“Yeah, well, I needed the money, y’know, and a big store like this pays better than a rinky-dink donut store, right?”

“Uh, sure,” Stevonnie said. A long pause followed, before Dewey realized that he’d only written down two questions in advance — the one he already asked, and “How are you?” — and fondly recalled how easy it was to hire people when he was Mayor.

“Congratulations, you got the job!” Dewey proclaimed, standing up and pushing the tall fusion out of his office. “You’ll start first thing tomorrow, see you then!”

“Oh, wow, um, thanks?” Stevonnie spluttered, surprised at how easy that was. “By the way, what job did I apply for?”

Dewey stared blankly at Stevonnie before silently shutting his door and closing the blinds. Stevonnie shrugged and walked out of the store, excited at their new employment status.

“Look at you go Stevonnie!” they said to themself. “Getting yourself a job. And it wasn’t even that hard! All you gotta do is go in tomorrow and act like you know what you’re doing! Piece of cake!”

\---

_ “Dewey, HELP,”  _ Jeff said over the intercom as a long line of customers formed at his register. “Why do we even have nine other registers if we can only afford one cashier?” he muttered to himself.

“Excuse me, I’d like to return these twenty-seven items,” a woman said, carrying several bags. “I bought them here, I’m sure of it, and I don’t want them, so I would like my money back.”

“Sorry, ma’am, we only do exchanges. And do you have a receipt?”

“No, I threw it out, but I bought this stuff here. And I do  _ not  _ want an exchange, I want my money back.”

Jeff sighed. He looked at the steadily-growing line. He paged Dewey again.  _ “Dewey to the front, please, Dewey to the front.” _

Then he looked at the time. “Dammit, he’s on break. Ma’am, I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait.” As the woman scoffed and walked out in a huff, he saw a sight for sore eyes walk through the doors. 

“Stevonnie?” he said as he rang up the next customer. “What’re you doing here? And what are you doing in a Malmart uniform…” His eyes were drawn to the Help Wanted sign in the window. “Oh no…”

“I got a job here!” Stevonnie squeed. “I’m excited to start working, and I only have a few questions, like what’s my job, what do I do, how do I ‘punch in’ and what the heck is ‘hardlines’?”

Jeff felt so sorry for ‘Vonnie, he nearly hit his head on the register. As soon as he got the chance, he would show them the ropes the best he could. Working here, they were going to need it.

After all, Steven and Connie were his best friends. So in that case, Stevonnie was the  _ ultimate  _ best friend.

\---

Stevonnie didn’t think of themself as much of a cashier, so they got started on stock-work. Luckily, thanks to having the combined strength of Steven and Connie, lifting boxes was a breeze. They were able to easily lift a washing machine for a customer, jump up to the highest bike rack to grab a bike (and float down gracefully) and shapeshift their arm long enough to grab something from the aisle over. They were happy to finally be the seller, not the buyer, and see what it was like to work in a big retail store like this.

On their lunch, they sat down with Jeff on the couch in the breakroom. “So,” Jeff began, “How’s your first day been?”

“Good! I got to help people, lift things, jump around, organize stuff… All the things I normally like doing!”

“Ah, well, just wait until you get cashier duty. Especially with Black Friday around the corner.”

“Black Friday? What’s that?”

\---

Stevonnie learned in the next week what Black Friday was. It meant they had to come in to work at the brink of dawn, wait for the doors to be broken down by a hoard of crazed shoppers and hope that nobody threw a fit because they weren’t getting the best deal.

“We’ve got incoming!” Jeff said from register #1.

“You’ve always wanted to say that, haven’t you?” Stevonnie said from register #2.

“Guilty as charged,” Jeff shrugged.

Stevonnie blinked, and suddenly there was a line at their register stretching off into the horizon. They got people out as fast as they could (which, thanks to their gem, was super-fast), but there was still more coming. Customer after customer, item after item, the same “How are you?” platitudes over and over, until Stevonnie finally felt fatigued. Their legs ached, their feet hurt and more than anything, they wanted to go home.

Eight hours later, they got home. Well, Connie’s home, anyway. Her parents were surprised to see  _ them  _ and not her, but they merely shrugged and rolled with it. Stevonnie was so tired, they just passed out in Connie’s bed, still fused. They remained fused throughout the night, and well into the morning.

\---

The holiday season may have been good for shoppers, but for employees? It was  _ Hell _ . Stevonnie kept getting calls about products they were sold out of, followed by angry visits by customers  _ swearing  _ that they saw it on the website, and if it was on the website, they  _ had  _ to have it in stock.

“Can you check in the back?” someone asked them for the umpteenth time.

Stevonnie sighed and went into the back, resting their legs on a box as they waited long enough for the customer to think they were actually looking. Looking in the back was nearly always fruitless, since every product was in plain, nondescript boxes that didn’t even say what was in them. But of course you could never tell a customer that, oh no, they seemed to think a whole other store was in the back.

Another problem was customers overestimating the store’s technology. They seemed to think that Stevonnie could just magically look up what was in the store on their UPC reader, featured on an easy-to-read map or something. That couldn’t be farther from the truth, and hopelessly searching the shelves for that One Specific Item never got easier.

Eventually, the stress got to be so much for Stevonnie that they couldn’t take it anymore. Two weeks before Christmas, they put in their two weeks notice and began the countdown.

It was fun for a while, but sometimes you just gotta know when to bail.

\---

“And your total will be $8.95,” Stevonnie said as they handed Sadie a box of donuts.

“My, my, how the tables have turned,” Sadie chuckled as she handed over the cash. “I remember when I used to serve you! Say, what happened to Dewey?”

“Probably having a nervous breakdown or something at Malmart.”

Sadie snorted. “He went  _ there?  _ I almost feel sorry for the guy.”

“Yeah,” Stevonnie mused. “Anyway, here’s your change. Have a nice day!”

“Oh hey, fancy seeing you here,” Jeff said as he walked past Sadie on her way out. “Uh, I saw that you guys are hiring? And, well, Malmart sucked ass, let’s just say it’s more fun when Peedee does it.”

Stevonnie almost burst into laughter. “Applications are over on the counter,” they directed.

As Jeff filled it out — merely a formality, Stevonnie was gonna hire him in a heartbeat — he asked the fusion a question. “Say, when did you unfuse last? Just curious.”

“The night before I started at Malmart. I figure Connie doesn’t have to go to school for another month, and in the meantime this just means they can be together more often.”

_ “Nice,”  _ Jeff commented.

It was nice, Stevonnie mused. So nice that, in the back of Stevonnie’s mind, they began wondering if Stevonnie could go to school in Connie’s place.

But it was just an idea.


End file.
